Targeted Village, The Vacumn Zone, One Shot, One Kill showing at peace film line-up at Keio University

Nov. 25 - Shinkû chitai (The Vacumn Zone) - Satsuo Yamamoto's 1952 film based on Hiroshi Noma's celebrated postwar novel. Called "the strongest anti-military film ever made in Japan...an exposé of the brutality and corruption of the Japanese army shown in its most revolting form" (Anderson and Richie, The Japanese Film). The story shows the life of a soldier who is reintegrated into the Imperial army after serving a prison term for theft. Surrounded by corrupt officers and comrades, he finds the military, with its systematic dehumanization, an even lonelier "no man's land" than prison.

The film—like Twenty-Four Eyes, Keisuke Kinoshita's 1954 film based on Sakae Tsubo's 1952 novel of the same name—was one of many Japanese antiwar films made during the postwar period. (Most of Japan's antiwar films are unavailable with English subtitles. Twenty-Four Eyes—which follows the story of a school teacher and her students during the period of heightened militarization from the 1930's through the Pacific War, and its aftermath—is an exception; released by Criterion.)

Dec. 17 - One Shot, One Kill - A documentary by Yukihisa Fujimoto that explores how the military breaks down the civilian values of young people, turning them into soldiers who will follow orders and kill.